| |  |  | The Reuters Daily Briefing | Thursday, May 12, 2022 by Linda Noakes | Hello Here's what you need to know. Finland moves to join NATO, North Korea reports its first COVID outbreak, and Bitcoin's 2021 gains are wiped out | | | | | Today's biggest stories  Smoke casts an orange haze as firefighters hold a briefing in the Black Lake, New Mexico area north of the Calf Canyon Hermits Peak wildfire, May 11, 2022.
U.S.
As America's weather gets wilder, its power network gets older. Reuters investigates how the grid, plagued by outages and increasingly severe weather, needs a trillion-dollar overhaul to handle the Biden administration’s promised clean-energy revolution.
The United States has now recorded more than 1 million COVID deaths, according to a Reuters tally, crossing a once-unthinkable milestone about two years after the first cases upended everyday life and quickly transformed it.
Legislation to make abortion legal throughout the United States was defeated in the Senate, amid solid Republican opposition. The Justice Department said that it was stepping up security for members of the Supreme Court ahead of an anticipated ruling that could scale back abortion rights.
A U.S. government investigation into the dark history of Native American boarding schools has found "marked or unmarked burial sites" at 53 of them, Interior Secretary Deb Haaland said.
Firefighters in northern New Mexico labored under an apocalyptic orange sky, and vehicles streamed out of the ski area of Angel Fire as wind-driven flames from the state's second-largest blaze on record roared closer to the mountain resort.
WORLD
North Korea reported its first COVID-19 outbreak, calling it the "gravest national emergency" and ordering a national lockdown, with state media saying an Omicron variant had been detected in the capital, Pyongyang.
European Union leaders said that the EU wants to become a bigger actor in Asia, which they termed a "theater of tensions", warning of an increasingly assertive China even as they called on Beijing to defend the multilateral global order.
Sri Lankans thronged buses in the main city Colombo to return to their hometowns during a brief relaxation in curfew, imposed after the prime minister quit and went into hiding and President Gotabaya Rajapaksa warned of anarchy. Sri Lanka's ruling family is in a fight for survival as the crisis worsens.
Australia's mighty #MeToo wave is piling pressure on mining and political leaders who are preparing to face a reckoning over sexual harassment scandals stretching from the arid Outback to Parliament House.
British police said they had now made more than 100 referrals for fines as part of their investigation into lockdown rule-breaking at gatherings held in Downing Street during the COVID pandemic.
|  Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, May 11, 2022 BUSINESS
Shares sank to a 1-1/2 year low and the dollar hit its highest in two decades, as fears grew that fast-rising inflation will drive a sharp rise in interest rates that brings the global economy to a standstill.
Japan's SoftBank reported a record $26.2 billion loss at its Vision Fund investment arm, as rising interest rates and political instability have whiplashed high-growth tech stocks.
Cryptocurrencies extended their sell-off, with Bitcoin falling to its lowest levels in 16 months as a stampede out of so-called stablecoins sent shockwaves around broader markets.
The world will not be left short of oil even with lower output from sanctions-hit Russia, the International Energy Agency said, in a U-turn after it predicted a possible "global supply shock" in March.
Britain's economy unexpectedly shrank 0.1% in March after a slump in car sales due to supply-chain problems, marking a weak end to the first quarter of a year when the risk of recession is looming.
| | | | | | | | | | | Video of the day  Jordanian craftsman makes swords out of car parts Motaz al Mazari keeps his family’s craft alive, adding his own twist. | | | Thanks for spending part of your day with us. | | | | | |
